top of page

How Climate Change can seriously affect your Health

  • Eduardo García Rodríguez
  • Feb 26, 2017
  • 6 min read

Updated: Apr 3, 2023

With the effects of climate change on the environment being taken into consideration by most of the general public, recent reports have revealed some of the alarming effects global warming can have on our health.

How can climate change affect our health?

The effects of climate change do not limit themselves to the environment, nature or biodiversity, but can also have a direct impact on your physical and mental health. Recent studies suggest that climate change can be a significant cause for diverse mental health issues, working as a “threat multiplier” that ultimately worsens existing mental problems.


In a recent event on Climate and Health, Dr. Lise Van Susteren, a Washington-based psychiatrist and expert on climate change and health, highlighted these threats along with the connection between climate change and mental health in a gathering attended by experts from different public health organisations, universities and groups that focused on the health impacts of climate change.


Over the years numerous studies have served to signal out this claim. In combination with other natural and human-influenced health-stressors, climate change can intensify existing health threats and spur new threats. Whilst factors like age, locations and economic resources are influential in determining the effects of these health hazards, preventive actions could be effective in reducing the severity of some of the health threats, but not all of them. What have some of these studies revealed? What are some of these threats? Here we will look at nine of the biggest health threats from climate change.



Extreme weather and higher levels of aggression:


In an interview with Live Science, Van Susteren pointed out to the results of a 2013 study published in the journal Science that sought to quantify the influence of climate on humans. Among the results, the study showed that increases in temperature and extreme rainfall had a correlation with increased levels of conflicts between individuals and groups alike. An explanation for this link between higher temperatures and aggression is that rising temperatures increase the levels of adrenaline produced in the body, which can subsequently lead to higher aggression.


Particles from air pollution can cause mental and neurological problems:


Another result highlighted by Van Susteren is the link between rising air-pollution levels, which grow with rising temperatures, and elevated risks of neurological and psychiatric problems. A cause for this is that when a person breathes particles that derive from air pollution; these can cause neural inflammation upon entering a person’s olfactory nerve. These inflammations are linked to grave mental disorders such as Alzheimer’s disease.


Air pollutants and poor air quality are linked to depression:


In several reports for Live Science, the American Psychological Association found that when pregnant women are exposed to air pollutants, their children are more likely to be affected by anxiety and depression.

Numerous studies in the USA and Europe are beginning to show that the physical damage of air pollution on people goes beyond cardiovascular and respiratory health issues. Recent reports show that high levels of air pollution are also having negative impacts on children’s cognitive abilities, as well as contributing to depression and cognitive decline in both children and adults.

Researchers have found that in areas with higher levels of air pollution, there is a higher rate of medications dispensed for psychiatric conditions in children and teens. This does not necessarily have to be because there is a larger population in areas with higher levels of pollution; however other factors in some of the locations where this research was carried out could have been influential, such as high number of mood disorders in countries like Scandinavia, such as Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD).

Nonetheless, these studies have also shown that on days with poor air quality there are higher registered emergency room visits for panic attacks and suicide attempts than on better days.

Air pollutants and poor air quality are linked to depression

Global Warming will heighten the risk of heart disease and heart attacks:


On its own, air pollution can set off as many heart attacks as alcohol, due to the inflammation of the heart because of contaminated air particles, or the inflammation of the lungs that lead to blood clots which damage the coronary arteries. When combined with ozone, and heat waves that derive from global warming, the risk of cardiac arrest increases dramatically.


Firstly, higher temperatures are known to cause noticeable decreases in heart-rate variability (the time regularity between each heartbeat which serves as a health indicator), and affects the body's sensitivity to toxins. Secondly, ozone and high air temperature can influence the way the nervous system works, causing irregularities in bodily functions including the heart's electrical activity and airflow into the lungs.


Allergies will worsen due to Global Warming and rising carbon dioxide levels:


So on one side, we have the high risk of losing the world's most important pollinators, bees, due to careless human intervention. However, Global Warming is also resulting in longer warm seasons, where plants are flowering earlier and for longer periods. This has resulted in elevated amounts of pollen that have worsened and lengthened allergies.


Extreme weather conditions will become more frequent and deadly:


It is a no-brainer: Global warming can result in heat waves floods and large storms that can result in elevated death tolls. Droughts are already considered one of the world's deadliest natural disasters, and an increase in temperatures can only worsen the number of droughts, as has already been recorded in Europe. Increased floods, when added to other human activities like deforestation, can also cause catastrophic damage.


Mosquitoes and diseases will spread with higher temperatures and rainfall:


Hate mosquitoes? You're going to see plenty of them with Global Warming. Just when you thought that mosquitoes were only prone to bother you during your summer holidays by the lake or the Mediterranean, you may be bound for an unpleasant surprise. But it isn't just the bothersome nature of the insects that is causing alarm; these bugs can carry life threatening diseases. An increase in heat and rainfall can make more areas in the world ripe for spreading diseases which are carried by hosts organisms, i.e. insects, that are cold-blooded and rely on the environment to control their internal heat. The warmer the temperature, the better the conditions for the insects, even more so when this coincides with rainfall, where waterborne diseases such as Malaria can surge due to the increase in mosquitoes.


Mosquitoes and diseases will spread with higher temperatures and rainfall


More deserts, less desserts, more diarrhea:


Humans are not using fertile land efficiently. Whilst enough has been said about deforestation, improper use of land along with persistent changes in climate can lead to serious soil degradation in areas that are already noticeably dry. If this soil gets degraded it becomes unproductive, and this affect land that is used for agriculture and feeding the world's population.


Additionally, desert dust can also have a side effect in ocean bacteria: Desert dust supplies iron to the ocean, which boosts the production of specific marine organisms, such as Vibrios, a group of ocean bacteria that can contaminate seafood. When people are exposed to this seafood, they can suffer gastroenteritis, eye and ear infections and even cholera.


Climate Change is making some people paranoid and deluded (more importantly, it is affecting younger generations):


Don't get me wrong; climate change is real. Even if some particular politicians prefer to deny it, at the expense of shunning 97% of the scientific community, global warming and climate change is an occurrence that can't be dusted under the rug. However, some people are taking to the news in worse ways that others. So, there was a case of a 17 year old boy in Australia who was hospitalised because of his grave distress over climate change. The doctors who treated him even gave his condition a name: "climate change delusion" and reported the case in the 2009 publication of the the Australian and New Zealand Journal of Psychiatry. It turns out the boy was so distressed by the idea of millions of people in drought-ridden countries dying of thirst, that he had refused to drink water to not contribute causing more pain to these people. Drastic as it may be, the real point here is that distress over climate change is not something that is limited to scientists, campaigners and libtards as some people would like to make believe. Children, adolescents and youths are also aware and concerned of climate change, and the slack approach of some politicians, industries and institutions to climate change can be a cause for anxiety.


The last thing environmentalists want to be is catastrophic, doomsday prophets. Raising awareness is a necessity, ranting and preaching is not. However, sometimes it is important to read into the effects current political and industrial decisions are having worldwide to understand and comprehend that saving the environment doesn't belong to a political agenda or a particular social class, but to a whole composite of society and that in the end we can all end up losing as a result of the greed of a selective minority.












Comments


bottom of page